Winning at Bridge will probably happen soon again for Blue Hill’s rookie bridge team, but it will never be as sweet as their upset victory at the ACBL Sectional Tournament in Bangor in October.

The team of Lacey Kellett, Marcia Tompkins, Will Taylor and David Snow, all new to tournament play, decided to give the Swiss Team Event a try—they not only tried, they showed the more seasoned players how to play Bridge by winning first in their stratified class!

Ranking by the ACBL is done by the awarding of points. They won 2.42 Silver points. Most competitive bridge players earn points in an effort to become a life Master. The ordinary points awarded at club games are black. The “hard to get points” are called pigmented, i.e. silver, red, gold and platinum. Pigmented points are awarded only at tournaments and special games. It now takes a total of 500 points to become a life master, a portion of which must be pigmented. To that end, the Rookie Team is on its way.

Here’s how a Swiss Team works. Two members of your team, playing as a partnership, sit North-South. Two other members of your team, also playing as a partnership, sit East-West at a different table. The two pairs of the opposing team fill in the empty spot at two tables. Exactly the same boards are played at both tables. After playing six boards, (hands), scores are compared and the teams move on to play different teams where winners play winners and losers play losers. This continues for eight rounds after which the highest numerical scores wins.

In other news: Congratulations to Bill Anderson of Deer Isle who made Life Master at our game in September. And, to Bob Lasky and Dennis Chamberlain who won 1st with a phenomenal, record-breaking game of 72.33 percent.